


Worse Things I Could Do

by Lampshadez



Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-03
Updated: 2017-01-03
Packaged: 2018-09-14 10:00:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9175576
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lampshadez/pseuds/Lampshadez
Summary: Wynonna cries in front of Dolls.





	

**Author's Note:**

> The title is from the song "There Are Worse Things I Could Do" from Grease. It's very "Imagine your OTP/BroTP"

They don't let Wynonna be the one to free Dolls.

They decide that she isn't expendable.  They decide that if they can't get Dolls back, it's a huge loss.  But if they lose Wynonna, it's all over.  So, they let her help plan how they're going to spring Dolls, but she doesn't get to go.

Besides, someone needs to keep watch for Waverly.  If she comes back, it shouldn't be to an empty house.

They decide Doc will be the one to free Dolls.  Doc isn't expendable, either, but for a very different reason than Wynonna - Wynonna should be protected at all costs, and Doc doesn't need to be.  He's the perfect person for the mission, since he won't die.

Nicole goes with him for backup.  She's trained for situations like this - okay, maybe she's not trained for prison breaks but she knows how to watch her back and watch her partner's back.  She knows how to handle a gun, if it comes to that, and she's got some first aid training, which is important because even though Doc is in fact a doctor, he's never seen a band-aid in his life.

No one was sure how Nicole would react once she knew the truth about the town.  Even when she sprang to action for Black Badge, basically pledging her loyalty to Dolls and the cause, Wynonna found herself waiting for the other shoe to drop (and she could tell Waverly and Dolls were waiting, too).  She found herself waiting for Nicole's entrancement with all the ridiculous supernatural goings on to run out, and for Nicole to leave Black Badge or even town.

She didn't, though.  If anything, she dove in deeper, especially once Waverly got possessed and Dolls got taken.

They had decided that Dolls was the priority - Waverly was in trouble but she could be contained.  Dolls was in enemy territory and he was the only one with any idea how to stop his bosses from destroying the town.

Still, it took a long time to find out where Dolls was.  It took even longer to create a plan to get him out.  By the time all that was through, Nicole had found a way to save Waverly.  Wynonna didn't know how she found the time; to Wynonna it felt like every waking hour was spent on freeing Dolls, calling in every last favor she had to try to figure out where the hell he was and how to get him out.

It turns out she had friends in high places, higher than she imagined.  It turns out that with a few phone calls, Wynonna Earp reconnected with old friends who had some serious dirt on high-ranking United States Army officials.  That was enough to call off the attack on Purgatory, and enough to get Dolls released.  But Wynonna had spent enough time with Dolls to know that, how he phrased it, when his bosses released prisoners, accidents tended to happen.  Dolls may be released, but there was no guarantee he'd make it back home.

Wynonna tried to find cures for Waverly, too, spending every waking minute between making phone calls or researching digging through Dolls' desk for answers.

Nicole found the answer, though, and cured Waverly.  And still, Nicole dove deeper in.  She had wanted answers since she first got to Purgatory, and now that she was getting some she wasn't going to stop.  And, damn if she was going to let anything happen to Waverly Earp.

So Waverly was cured, with minimal damage other than a hell of a migraine and a scar on her hand going up her arm from how the goo traveled through her.  She was cured just as the specifics for the plan to free Dolls was coming together, which left her with a lot of time to recover.  She certainly wasn't going to free Dolls, and her research expertise was past needed at this point.  She was safer.

Turns out she felt safer elsewhere, though.  One night, two days after she was cured, she stood up from a rushed dinner with Wynonna, Nicole, and Doc in Dolls' office over maps and paperwork and plans and said she was going to get some air.

She didn't come back.  They looked for her, Nicole put a BOLO out with the sheriff's department (and only barely with the sheriff's permission, but he let it slide.  He knew parts of what happened after Bobo's party - he knew Nicole had been shot, he knew Willa had gone rogue.  He cut Nicole some slack).  But then they noticed that their wallets, which had been in the bigger room of the Black Badge office with their coats and bags, were empty, and when they got back to the homestead, Waverly's stuff was gone.  Not all of it, but about as much as she'd pack in a single bag.

 

Before Waverly left, the group wasn't sure who'd go with Doc.  They thought maybe Wynonna would call in a favor, ask one of her old gang buddies to help.  They owed her a few favors still.  But the morning after Waverly left, Nicole came into work bright and early, the same time as everyone else had been, and volunteered to go.  She wouldn't be talked out of it, not when they reminded her that she had very recently been shot, or that it was dangerous, or that she didn't need to go.  She didn't want to hear it.  She was going.

So they made their plan.  And, one day soon after, they went.

**-WE-**

Wynonna locked herself in the Black Badge office while she waited for them to come back or call her or anything.  She didn't know what to do with herself, she always hated waiting.  She paced a bit.  She ordered Chinese food and surprised herself by managing to eat all of it.  She didn't know she was hungry, she had just ordered it to have something to do and look forward to but when it arrived she realized she'd barely eaten since they finalized the plan.

She had Gus keeping an eye on the homestead, in case Waverly went back there.

She wandered into the break room and toyed with the idea of dipping into Neadley's whiskey stash, but ultimately decided against.  She did drink five cups of coffee that day, though.

And then, finally, she got a call.

"Hey," Nicole said. "We're in the parking lot.  We're okay. Help us bring him up."

**-WE-**

Before going out to get him, they broke into Dolls' safe and split his medicine three ways - a third each for Doc and Nicole, and a third at Black Badge.  That way, if anything happened to Doc or Nicole, the other would have some and there would still be more at Black Badge.

They got Dolls upstairs and Wynonna grabbed the rest of the medicine.  They hadn't given him any when he was locked up, and he needed as much as he could get.

"You broke into my safe?" he asked, pained, as Doc took the injector from Wynonna's shaking hands and injected Dolls.

"You didn't exactly leave us the code," Wynonna said.  She looked up at Doc and Nicole.  "You're alright?"

Doc nodded, though there was a significant gash on his head.  "Tis but a scratch."

"Monty Python?"

Doc nodded again, but hesitated to speak.  "Yeah, uh...Waverly suggested I watch them, a while back.  I am sorry, I don't know why I said that."

Nicole cleared her throat.  "Doc here's a hero.  You should've seen him out there, he really was the sharpest shot in the West."

Wynonna smiled softly.  "You're okay?"

Nicole nodded.  "I'm fine.  A bit bruised up but that's not new."

Wynonna nodded.

Nicole exchanged a glance with Doc.  "Come on, let's go get cleaned up."

They left and Wynonna sat down across from Dolls.

"You're alright?"

He nodded, though the movement clearly pained him.

"I'm alright."

Wynonna exhaled shakily.  All the emotion (and, to be honest, a lot of the coffee) was finally catching up to her.  "Good."

"That was stupid."

"What?"

"You shouldn't have sent them," Dolls said.  "I would've been fine, they could've gotten hurt-."

"We weren't going to leave you there," Wynonna cut him off.

"You've made enemies," Dolls cut her off now.  "I know you pulled strings to get me out but they do not like being outsmarted by some back country outlaw."

"You've got a funny way of saying thank you."

Dolls held her gaze and damn, it felt good.  He wasn't sure exactly how long it had been, but it felt like way too long.

"Thank you," he said, meaning it.  "Thank you, Wynonna."

"You're welcome."

Wynonna moved her chair closer to his and put a hand on his knee.

"We can find Waverly," Dolls said, and Wynonna felt the tears that threatened to escape finally fall down her cheeks.  "We have the resources."

Wynonna shook her head, bit her lip.  "No," she said.  "She didn't leave so we could find her.  She left so she could leave."

Dolls nodded, following that train of thought.

"But you're back,' Wynonna continued.  She hit his knee a bit, not sure what to do with her hand on him but knowing that she wanted it there.

Dolls nodded, studying her.  "I'm back."

"You're back," she repeated.  "And you're here."

"I'm here.  I'm not going anywhere."

Wynonna nodded, jaw clenched, trying to stop the tears but really failing.  "Good."

She stood, took her hand off his knee, and walked away a little bit.

"Is it cold in here?  I think I might've left a window open."

"The windows don't open," Dolls said, standing as well.

Wynonna stepped toward him when he stood, she was worried about him moving.

So they stood, staring at each other.

Wynonna wiped her eyes.  "God, I feel stupid.  I don't  _do_ this."

"Do what?"

"Cry," Wynonna said.  "You're back, it's a good thing."

"Oh, it is?  I wasn't sure, with all the crying."

Wynonna glared at him.

"It's okay," he said.  "I'm okay and everything else...everything else will be okay."

Wynonna hadn't noticed that Dolls was walking towards her until her was right in front of her.

She stood still for just a moment, and it felt like everything around her froze, too.

Then she threw her arms around him, shutting the gap between them and pulling him close, feeling him in her arms and proving to herself that he was really there.

She cried into his chest and they just stayed like that for a while.  She needed this, to finally let it all go.  Things were so, so wrong but not everything.  Sometimes when things went so, so wrong, they got better.  She was learning that.

Her personal code of never crying in front of someone had been broken, but she was fine with it.  

Dolls held her close to him, letting himself feel another person for the first time in too long.  He'd had contact with other people - guards moving him, prison doctors trying to figure him out, Doc and Nicole helping him to safety.  But he hadn't had contact on his own terms in so, so long and he needed it, too.  He was never comfortable with people crying, and he'd seen a lot of it through his line of work.  But he felt alright there.  He felt good there.

"I'm glad you're back," Wynonna said quietly after a while, when her crying had slowed down enough that she could talk.

"Yeah," he said. "Me, too."

**Author's Note:**

> I know I've written stuff in which Waverly leaves before but I think where my writing mood is at now is basically we are all working with a finite amount of source material (the show), so I think I right now more enjoy exploring themes/topics/plots I've already addressed and twisting them and taking new angles rather than coming up with all new stuff. Not that I won't write any new stuff that I haven't done before, but two things I posted today have plot elements I've already done. So, bear with me on this. I'm trying to explore what I've written already in new ways and I hope you all like it! Thank you all for reading and please let me know what you think of this! I very rarely write Wynonna-centric stuff so please let me know how you think I did!


End file.
